Muni

Muni announced an ambitious plan today to replace all of its fare gates with TransLink-only machines by fall 2010. In coordination with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), which manages the TransLink program regionally, Muni will install a total of 98 new fare gate aisles at its nine Muni Metro stations, as well as up to 40 new TransLink-only ticket vending machines. Extra-wide, ADA-compliant fare gate lanes will also be installed. Muni showed off demonstration models of the new machines at a press conference at Van Ness Station today.

A collision this morning between an M-Ocean View Muni Metro light rail vehicle and a male bicyclist has left the cyclist in the hospital with serious injuries.

On Sunday BART workers might strike, throwing Bay Area transportation into chaos. It's a tiny echo of the kind of warfare that used to erupt regularly a century ago on the streetcar lines of San Francisco. 1,500 streetcar men voted to strike for an 8-hour day, leading to "Bloody Tuesday," May 7, 1907, when gunfights exploded between armed guards and men shooting from nearby vacant lots, while strikebreakers housed in United Railroads carbarns opened fire on protesting crowds, killing two and injuring 20. By the time the strike was lost in March 1908, six had been killed in the violence, 250 more hurt, and over two dozen had died in accidents on the system while it was run by scab labor.

A BART strike will leave hundreds of thousands of riders in search of an alternate commute on Monday. Since most of the region's largest transit agencies are already operating near capacity during peak hours, new riders - as well as current riders - will have to squeeze onto already-crowded buses and trains.

With support for bus stop consolidation building, local leaders are starting to weigh in on political strategies for implementing a new stop spacing policy.

Muni's new chief safety officer went before a Board of Supervisors committee today to explain what's being done to prevent crashes like the two major rail collisions that have happened in the last month. Supervisor Bevan Dufty, who chaired the hearing, said the crash at Market and Noe Streets on August 3rd, in which an SUV was crushed between two historic F-line streetcars, "could easily have been a fatal accident."

After reports of fare inspectors and drivers telling Muni passengers they can't take photos on Muni's buses and trains, the MTA is being forced to craft a photo policy and make it public. The San Francisco Appeal and WHAT IM SEEING both have stories today about Muni's elusive policy, which MTA spokesperson Judson True told the Appeal will be posted online soon, and "will say that non-commercial video and photography will be OK as long as it doesn't disturb transit."

In New York, the standard icon of corporate prestige is a gleaming tower downtown bearing a company's name. Here in the Bay Area, one of the preferred symbols is a sprawling, parking lot-ringed "corporate campus" off US-101 (Google, Yahoo) or I-280 (Apple,) 30 miles or more from the region's densest city. Ironically, though these campuses were designed for convenience, many Silicon Valley employees prefer to reside in San Francisco. As a result, companies have discovered the recruiting value of something transportation planners have long touted: high-quality, car-free transportation.

MTA Chief Nat Ford sought to assure the MTA Board of Directors today that the agency is taking the appropriate steps to address safety concerns, despite two high-profile crashes in two weeks that he called "disturbing."